Is this a "down year" for the West because there aren't top teams

I think it has to do with injuries and the fact that the West is cannibalizing itself. East is top heavy so the better teams win more games... the pels got SWEPT by the current 10 seed Jazz. 12th place Lakers have beat pels, nuggets, kings,etc.

Outside of playing the Rockets and Spurs - every western conference game is a toss-up, essentially

0 teams in the West have a winning record on the road. Kinda crazy there isn’t at least one.

This is why a move this year could actually put us in the Finals.

The West wont always be this way so you take your opportunities as they come and dont wait for the door to open. You walk through it when you absolutely can.

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Boston, Milwaukee, Brooklyn, and Philly are all legit title contenders, and Cleveland could beat any of them in a 7 game series.
Those 4 teams are all favorites to win it over whoever you think is the best team in the West, except a healthy GSW.

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I don't watch enough Grizzlies or Nuggets games to speak on them but I don't know if I agree with that assumption when compared to the Pels if we're healthy (huge if I know). I feel like come playoff time we could be favorites over 2 of those teams. Boston I feel like will be slightly clearer after tonight but they, healthy Milwaukee and Cleveland are the only ones that I feel like we match up poorly with from that list. Cleveland has 2 post defenders that could give Zion trouble and 2 legit scorers at guard, not sure if they have enough wing defense though. Boston has a ton of shooting and can play switch defense with 5 good/great defenders and still have some rim protection. Giannis is what I would build on 2K to stop Zion and with Middleton I think the Bucks have enough scoring to beat us. Brooklyn I think we can score with, I trust Kyrie to be less that his regular season self come playoffs, and I think Zion terrifies Simmons. We split with Philly and while Embid is scary af in a 7 game series Harden doesn't get those phantom calls in the playoffs and I feel confident playoff harden will show up when he's needed least. *IF we were to make the finals I wouldn't be surprised to see us beat the sixers, cavs or nets. I would be surprised to beat the Celtics or Bucks.

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OR have the top teams in the West, the current top 3 seeds, had starters miss a ton of games so they don't look as strong as they actually are?

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To steal from Pels Twitter cause I agree, this is being billed as a wide open West because the names at the top (DEN, NOP, MEM) aren't flashy names like GS/DAL/LAL.

If you flip flopped each set of those 3 teams, no one would be saying the West is wide open.

The Kings are 5th in the West. The 6th seed in the West is 1 game over .500. Any other year, it wouldn't make sense to say the West is wide open when basically 2/3rds of the league is effectively playing .500 ball.

Bruh BI has missed 26 GAMES....that's ridiculous man.

This time last year, you had 2 teams in the West with 30 wins already and 2 more at 28 & 29 wins. The 7/8th place teams were around .500.

This year, nobody is to 30 yet. The 1st place teams would be 5th in last year's standings. The 7/8th place teams are around .500 again.

So it's not so much that the west is "down" as there is just more parity overall. The 5th best team from last year was 22-18 at this point. The 5th best team right now is 21-18. The top for just don't have the runaway teams compared to last season.